Social Change and the Bowl Haircut

Welcome to the Twilight Zone of social responsibility – the place where corporations do just enough to be seen to do something "responsible" rather than committing to solving a specific social issue. I call this space “CSR Lite”.?

On the one hand, there is ample evidence to suggest that businesses who are genuinely committed to making change will benefit in many ways. Some of these include happier and more productive employees, reduced employee turnover, more differentiation from competitors, increased sales, and more loyal investors. On the other hand, even these valuable outcomes aren’t enough to convince business leaders to move beyond doing the bare minimum and the gene pool of corporations that are making social change a priority doesn’t seem to be growing.

Thinking about this led me to wonder if the problem was a lack of accountability for social change among corporate leadership. While many companies now have leaders in the C-Suite who are responsible for corporate social responsibility, how many corporations have prioritized social change at the highest level?

I did a Google search for “chief social change officer” and got exactly two results. Most notably, I discovered that Ted Gummy is Chief Social Change Officer at BOWLCUTSEC an organization that is calling for the return of the bowl haircut.

According to BLOWLCUTSEC, while the bowl haircut was historically an easy and relatively neat cut done by a non-professional, the bowl cut was seen by some as a sign of poverty that signified the wearer as someone who couldn’t afford to visit a barber. In 2018 this group issued a call to arms to establish the bowl hair cut as a sign of power and dominance. In their words, “A crown suitable for a warrior king”. It’s clear that this lofty mission required the right leadership and I’m confident that there’s no one more qualified than Mr. Gummy to advocate for more access to the bowl haircut.

Another search for “chief corporate social responsibility officer” revealed about thirty thousand results. Some of the companies that believe CSR is important enough to appoint an executive to oversee actions in this area include Accenture, Verizon, Fifth Third Bank and Toyota Motor North America. Are these companies leaders because they’ve elevated social responsibility to the C-Suite? Or, are they taking the practice of “CSR lite” to an even higher level by creating an executive role for a function that is too often characterized by optics and rhetoric rather than results?

When I searched for “chief social impact officer” I got about 5,000 results including the recent announcement of Erin Reilly at Twilio’s first-ever chief social impact officer. “My new title is a great example of what’s changed in CSR,” said Reilly in a recent interview with Forbes.?“Back when I started in this field, I didn’t know anyone with the title chief social impact officer, much less know of anyone in CSR reporting into the CEO.” Earlier this month, BMO Financial Group announced the appointment of?Kimberley Goode?as Chief Communications & Social Impact Officer. According to BMO, “Ms. Goode will lead a new team combining the Communications practice areas of Employee Communications, Media Relations, and Government Relations with the Purpose and Community Giving teams,?creating a single organization unified in its focus on achieving the bank's strategic priorities and purpose”.

Needless to say, the appointment of people like Reilly and Goode to social impact leadership positions is an important step in the right direction. However, I find myself wondering if social impact goes far enough. Is having an impact the same as contributing to social change? What does it mean to say a company has made an impact? Is measuring impact the same as measuring change? Are the qualifications required for make an impact the same as helping to solve a social problem?

Companies with serious IT problems don’t hire people who are homeless. They hire IT people with the experience needed to solve the problem. This makes sense. Leaders at these same companies don’t hesitate to make decisions about how to address important social issues they have no direct experience in. This doesn’t make sense.

I think every corporation ought to have a chief social change officer and I’ve started to create a job description that companies can use to recruit the right people for this important role. Here is the qualification that would be required for a candidate to be successful and some of the priorities for this position.

Primary Qualification: First-hand experience of the social problem that we’ve committed to solving.

Measure of Success: Our company has helped to solve a social problem and benefited from doing so.

Key Priorities:

·?????Our program reflects the priorities and experience of people with lived experience.

·?????All program communications are developed by, or in partnership with, community organizations instead of our advertising or PR agencies.

·?????We can assess business results and social change outcomes.

·?????Our work in this area is being done in a way that’s honest, respectful, trustworthy and accountable.

Reporting Relationships: CEO and an advisory council of community leaders and people with lived experience of the issue we’re committed to solving.

This brings me back to BLOWLCUTSEC’s leadership in being what looks like one of the few?companies in the world to have a chief social change officer. I would love to get a copy of the job description for this role but there doesn’t seem to be a way of contacting the company – perhaps they’re too busy working to solve the pressing problem of increasing access to the bowl haircut.